untable
dangers presented themselves to us in the next. I really feared that every
precaution would have proved unavailing against such multiplied
embarrassments, and that ere night we should have possessed only the
wrecks of the expedition. From this state of anxiety, however, we were
unexpectedly relieved, by our arrival at 2 p.m. at the termination of the
Morumbidgee; from which we were launched into a broad and noble river,
flowing from E. to W. at the rate of two and a half knots per hour, over
a clear and sandy bed, of a medium width of from three to four hundred
feet.

During the first stages of our journey upon this new river, which
evidently had its rise in the mountains of the S.E., we made rapid
progress to the W.N.W. through an unbroken and uninteresting country of
equal sameness of feature and of vegetation. On the 23rd, as the boats
were proceeding down it, several hundreds of natives made their appearance
upon the right bank, having assembled with premeditated purposes of
violence. I was the more surprised at this show of hostility, because we
had passed on general friendly terms, not only with those on the
Morumbidgee, but of the new river. Now, however, emboldened by numbers,
they seemed determined on making the first attack, and soon worked
themselves into a state of frenzy by loud and vehement shouting. As I
observed that the water was shoaling fast, I kept in the middle of the
stream; and, under an impression that it would be impossible for me to
avoid a conflict, prepared for an obstinate resistance. But, at the very
moment when, having arrived opposite to a large sand bank, on which
they had collected, the foremost of the blacks had already advanced
into the water, and I only awaited their nearer approach to fire
upon them, their impetuosity was restrained by the most unlooked
for and unexpected interference. They held back of a sudden, and
allowed us to pass unmolested. The boat, however, almost immediately
grounded on a shoal that stretched across the river, over which she
was with some difficulty hauled into deeper water,--when we found
ourselves opposite to a large junction from the eastward, little
inferior to the river itself. Had I been aware of this circumstance, I
should have been the more anxious with regard to any rupture with the
natives, and I was now happy to find that most of them had laid aside
their weapons and had crossed the junction, it appearing that they had
previously been o